


so hold my hand consign me not to darkness

by pududoll (aprilclash)



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hunger Games Setting, Anal Sex, Angst, Angst and Porn, Explicit Sexual Content, M/M, Mentions of Death, Mentions of Murder, Mentions of Prostitution, Oral Sex, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, it's a HG verse so it's basically angst, unbetaed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-27
Updated: 2017-02-27
Packaged: 2018-09-27 06:17:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,192
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9980045
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aprilclash/pseuds/pududoll
Summary: "Everyone has a chance, even you."Ten will probably die in the Hunger Games. A deal with the winner of the last edition might be his only chance.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first fic in this fandom, so I am nervous. I'm not sure about the characterization, actually I'm not sure about anything, but I'm always open for suggestions and polite criticism. Just a few things before we start:  
> \- this fic is part of a bigger series i'm plotting about ten and johnny and their life as former winners of the hunger games.  
> \- tributes can be boys and girls from 12 to 18 years old. both johnny and ten were chosen when they were 18 years old so there's no underage sex in this fic.  
> \- about the names, i chose to use ten's stage name and not his real one after I read [this post about thai k-idols' names](http://renjunstoothgap.tumblr.com/post/155516544808/rant-about-thai-k-idols). for johnny's name, i like both his korean and american name, i simply chose the first one because i liked it more.  
> \- i actually love yerim she's my baby lol  
> \- most info on the hg verse comes from the wikia, since i haven't read the books in a long time  
> \- title comes from the song "Broken Crown" by Mumford & Sons  
> \- happy birthday ten!!! but actually this is fic is not for you, but for my dear friend silvia (@/yaori94 on twitter) who's always ready to support me  
> \- EDIT: the biggest thank you to ao3 user Vices_Versus_Virtues for telling me District 8 is textiles, not paper. Paper is District 7 ;; I edited. Thank you again ;;;;  
> Lastly, don't forget this is a work of fiction, be polite and enjoy ♥

When they ask him to talk about his home, Ten falters. His mind struggles for a moment, drunk synapses clashing against each other, frantically working to conjure an image of the trees, of the forest at midday after a long morning of work, when the morning dew has just barely stopped shining among the pine needles and the paper mill shines in the distance. The memories are stored somewhere in his own mind, for him to take, but he can’t. He can’t.

“I… Uhm… District Seven is my home, and…”

“How does it look like? Can you tell us, Ten?”

Ten has never been good with images, not since he almost lost his eyesight in an incident at the paper mill when he was only six years old, fearless and barefoot and running around where he shouldn’t have. It wasn’t the end of the world. He healed. Slowly. His parents dug into the credits they had been saving for years, just for him, and now Ten can see again. And now Ten will die in the Hunger Games. What a waste.

The blinking red lights of the cameras all fade into the white hot limelight. The anchor’s smile tightens in an imperceptible way. Ten is sure no one will notice it at home, but he notices. Taeyeon, too, notices.

He recovers graciously, well, graciously enough, blinking for a few times while Taeyeon violently waves the cue cards in front of him, barely out of the camera field. In the end, he sputters something about being thankful to District Seven, for always taking care of him. He says how much he loves producing paper for Capitol City and for Panem, and how he had never wished to do anything else, anything different. He doesn’t say he wants to win the Hunger Games for his people because he thinks everyone would laugh.

Caesar seems happy enough about his answer and doesn’t push, moving onto more interesting tributes instead, and Ten smiles and heaves a relieved sigh.

In his mind, he repeats the word _home_ again and again, many times, and thinks about the smell of pinewood, chemicals and new paper, his mom’s pies, his sister’s lipstick, rose and plastic and luxury - she won it at the annual lottery and for a few months it was the most expensive thing in the whole neighborhood. He thinks about Taeyong’s dirty hands on his mouth, his laughter as he tried to stop Ten from saying something embarrassing about him to the daughter of the mayor. He thinks about the way the ground felt during short summer nights, just before the rain, when the entire world smells like earth and humidity. 

He breathes in, but Capitol City smells like perfume and depravation and it makes his head spin and his nose twitch, and his chest feels tight. He feels like a trapped mouse, but he smiles and he waves to the camera and he does his best to look like he belongs here, but he can’t help but think everyone can read the blind fear in his eyes. The eyes of someone who’ll be dead in less than a week.

He’s seen the other tributes. The girl from the First is a fucking monster. She looks at him and he feels like she’s breaking him in half just with a glare. She smiles, a sharp promise. Ten doesn’t smile back. It wouldn’t be convenient to smile back to a girl who’s already tasting the moment of your death at her hands.

It’s too hot in the television studio, it’s melting down his makeup. His skin itches.

He doesn’t know when they’ll be able to go back to their room but he can hardly wait. He wants to find a bed and flop down on it, sneaking under warm, soft blankets, a luxury he’s never known before, and then he wants to cry and think that he’ll be dead in less than a week.

“Do you wish someone would have stepped in and volunteered to take your place?” asks Caesar, and it’s only when Yerim elbows him in the ribs that he realizes Caesar has been talking with him.

“Me?” he asks, weakly - oh god, Yerim is sighing, he must look so dumb - and Caesar laughs at his words and repeats the question with his booming voice.

Memories, again. Ten is angry. He _is_ angry, even though he never lets it show. Not even when he almost lost his sight and had to walk around with a cane for two long years. Ten never stops smiling. 

Only his mother, father, and some of his older brothers and sisters have actually seen him angry. And Taeyong. Because Taeyong was Ten’s best friend and he’s seen Ten screaming at the sky in the middle of the forest. He’s seen Ten cry and laugh and come apart under his hands.

And Ten has seen Taeyong fidget during the Reaping, after Ten’s own name was called. He has seen the way his best friend tried to lift his hand, to volunteer. He’s seen him shake. He’s angry because, for a moment, he had hoped Taeyong would really do it, go to the Hunger Games in Ten’s place. He was angry when Taeyong didn’t and he’s angry that he hoped he would.

He looks at the camera and says, his voice clearer than it’s ever been during this recording, “To be honest, I wouldn’t want anyone to sacrifice their life for me. Sure, maybe I would be happy at first, but we all know how the Hunger Games work. That person would probably die, and I wouldn’t be able to live with that burden either.”

There’s silence for a moment, following his words. Yerim, at his side, wearing her tight little dress, with flowers in her red hair, prettiest than she’s ever looked with one of those shapeless uniforms in District Seven, looks almost jealous. Ten supposes he must’ve looked cool while he said it.

He hopes Taeyong is watching this broadcast. He stares inside the lens of the camera as if he’s looking at his best friend instead and he hopes all the words he’s not saying can reach Taeyong. 

_It’s fine, don’t feel guilty. I wouldn’t have wanted you to do it. I’m not angry. You’re my best friend. Thank you. For wanting to do it. Thank you. For not doing it._

Everyone knows he doesn’t have any chances. He’s not strong, he can’t use any weapons and he even has bad eyesight. He’s basically cannon fodder. He folds his hands in his lap, looks at the camera and tries to look half as pretty as Yerim does, because he needs sponsors. He doesn’t have a chance, but that doesn’t mean he’s not going to try.

~

Like most misery, it started with apparent happiness. The Reaping was the day of Nina’s birthday and their mom had made a cake for her. It was a little too crispy at the edges, leaning on outright burnt, but there was a tiny portion of jam inside, and Ten wondered, briefly, how much did his mother pay for it, before he had to fend off five or six screaming children for his slice.

He remembers eating his cake, quickly and stubbornly, two slices, because he was Nina’s favorite. His whole family was there except Dew, who lived with her husband on the other side of the District, close to the paper mill, and couldn’t be there for the cake. (Ten didn’t see her at the Reaping and he’ll probably never see her again.)

They dressed in silence and went towards the clearing and Ten pretended to ignore the tightness at the edge of his mother’s smile. He was a boy, and not so young on top of that, but with his eyes being as fucked up as they were the probability of his name being extracted were very low. His mother was much more worried for Ellie, who was almost sixteen.

Except Ten was chosen, not Ellie, not Nina, not one of his little brothers and sisters. They called his name and he had just a second to realize that, yes, it was his own name, before he started to fall. They didn’t even let him say goodbye to his family properly, because they were already hauling him on the train together with Yerim, the daughter of the blacksmith, introducing him to Taeyeon, his mentor, and telling him he had nothing to worry about.

Ten repeats it in his head, countless times. _You have nothing to worry about. Everything can happen. You can still win._ He doesn’t believe himself, not even for a moment.

“You’re an idiot. What were you doing, spacing out like that?” Yerim’s voice is a little shrill. She’s only fifteen and prettier than every other tribute this year, but Ten has seen her bully the kids who couldn’t afford bread and eggs and he doesn’t like her.

“It was just a little overwhelming,” he says with a smile, and Yerim grimaces.

“A little overwhelming? Do you even listen to yourself?” Her lips disappear in a tight line. “In less than a week everyone will be trying to kill you and you still think you have the time to daydream?”

She turns towards Taeyeon, but she only smiles nervously and mutters something under her breath.  
“Don’t make a scene here, there might still be cameras.”

She bows to the mentor of the Sixth, a grim-looking man who poisoned the river fifteen years ago and waited for the other tributes to fall, one after another. He almost smiles, because that’s what Taeyeon does.

If Yerim is pretty, Taeyeon is stunning. Ten was young when she won the Hunger Games, but not too young to forget the tiny girl with blonde locks and a sweet smile who charmed the entire Panem with big eyes and long lashes. The other tributes didn’t deem that little pixie from the Seventh District worth of their attention, and she simply proceeded to stab them the back the moment they turned it on her. She won because she was cute and pretty and apparently harmless. She won because she was ruthless.

Ten guesses she’s trying to apply the some strategy to Yerim, and surprisingly enough it’s working. Yerim was the daughter of the blacksmith in the Seventh, and from her father she learned how to be strong, to never apologize and how to always fight for what she wants. Ten would never consider her harmless, but apparently the rest of Panem has fallen for her red hair and porcelain skin. Most of the other tributes have fallen for her in the same way.

When she boasts about the alliance requests she’s received the following day at dinner, Ten inwardly scoffs and outwardly smiles.

“I don’t know what you’re feeling proud about. They will keep you around until the end and they will kill you, Yeri,” he says, soft and warm in a way that makes her face redden with fury. “Being pretty won’t save you.”

“It saved Taeyeon-noona,” she snaps back, high-pitched and poisonous, because they both know Ten is right. The other mentors know Taeyeon, the other tributes know Taeyeon - heck, everyone knows Taeyeon. They won’t fall for the same trap twice.

“Still, it’s better than just giving up and waiting to be slaughtered in the arena, just like you. Stupid.”  
He doesn’t bother with an answer and that makes her even angrier.

“Since you have no intention of putting up a fight why don’t you let me kill you immediately, when the games begin?” she asks, and wow, she’s always been a little nasty, but this is cruel. Ten feels the urge to slap her, but it would be useless.

She will probably die, just like Ten, just like most of the tributes, and if she had been a better person he would’ve felt sad for her, but as things are he just doesn’t care. He doesn’t care about her, about Taeyeon who’s already decided which of her two horses is most likely to win, he doesn’t care about the public in Panem who will be cheering as they fall and die, he doesn’t care about these games at all.

For a moment, he thinks how nice would it be to just give up, and fuck them all. They’ve basically condemned him to death and now they expect him to dance at the snap of their fingers. How arrogant.

But he can’t. They would punish his family instead, and he has too many brothers and sisters he actually cares about at home. And Taeyong. Taeyong would be fucking angry to see him going down without a fight.

He leaves Yerim there, face blotched and unattractive and angry. He almost bumps into Taeyeon as he leaves the room and she asks him where he’s going. “To take a walk,” he says, “I feel choked here.”

Let them prioritize and strategize. It’s useless. Ten walks down the corridor and hopes to find a magic door to the wonderland, anything to get away from this.

~

The building is huge and pretty, all sleek lines, glass and metal, so Capitol City it hurts. It’s like being trapped in an elegant cage and it makes Ten feel restless, so he takes the elevator until the last floor, until he finds the terrace.

He doesn’t like when people see him getting angry. Maybe it’s a little stupid, but his anger is his own and he doesn’t want anyone else to see it, not even Taeyeon and Yerim. Especially Taeyeon and Yerim.

He stares at the stars until he’s breathing normally again, slow and nice, and only then he starts heading back.

It happens on his way back to his room, in the large corridor in front of the elevator. One moment he’s walking and hoping Taeyeon is not too angry he stormed out like that, one moment later he’s slamming into someone and falling on the ground with a soft exhale and an even softer thud. He groans and looks up, and it takes a seemingly endless time for his gaze to rake on the longest legs he’s ever seen. When his eyes finally reach the other boy’s face, Ten is sure the sound he lets out is not dignified, or human.

“Is everything alright?”

It’s a bit cathartic, like a moment from one of those cheesy, cheap romance movies they show sometimes on the big screen installed in the clearing back in District Seven. Ten wants to reply but the words just refuse to go past his lips.

He knows Johnny Seo. Everyone knows Johnny Seo. Like, literally, _everyone_. Last year’s winner. Tragically handsome. Panem’s tall hero with a crushing, devastating smile. Oh, but he’s even more handsome in person. Ten has to restrain himself from blushing. It doesn’t work.

It comes to his mind, briefly, that he’s blushing in front of a boy who became famous for killing at least thirteen other teenagers with a trident. And for a moment, a horrible and shameful moment, Ten wonders what it would be like to fall at the hands of someone like Johnny Seo. He looks like he can make everything look pretty and graceful, almost effortless.

Johnny Seo blinks, as if he can read Ten’s thoughts and - oh god - he’s been staring at a celebrity from the floor for more than it’s socially acceptable _get a grip on yourself, Ten_.

“Everything alright,” he replies, still a bit dazed.

“You sure?” asks Johnny, leaning down to look at him.

Ten’s brain is so close to short-circuiting. What is he doing here? He steals a quick glance at his badge and finally realizes he must have come here as a mentor for his district. He briefly remembers the two tributes from District Four, who did the interviews on their own because their mentor had a prior commitment and hadn’t been able to make it this morning. He had thought they were even more unlucky than him because, as useless as Taeyeon has been, at least she has come to Ten’s interviews. He couldn’t have imagined their mentor was actually the Johnny Seo, winner of the last edition of the hunger games, now standing in front of him in flesh, bones and dashing smile, his hair still wet from a shower and his shirt half-undone.

“John Seo.” A hand is thrust under Ten’s nose, and it’s only hen he tries to shake it that he realizes the other boy meant to help him up. He does it almost effortlessly. His hand is big and warm and he smells like the sea Ten has never seen. “My friends can call me Johnny.”

He smiles expectantly and Ten’s heart skips a beat. Did he smile like this to his enemies too? Johnny was a charismatic leader and he had a lot of allies, but in the end he was forced to kill them all to survive. Ten is ninety-nine percent sure he smiled at all of them like this. It is devastating up-close.

“Nice to meet you, John Seo,” he says, even though he’s been calling him Johnny in his mind for months, since he won the games. He tries to take a step back, but Johnny doesn’t let go of his hand.

“It’s Johnny, not John. We’ve barely met and you’re already refusing to be my friend?” There’s something his voice, part amusement and part disbelief. “Relax kid, it’s not like you’ll be meeting me on the arena. We can totally be friends.”

“No, we can’t,” he says. He knows he’ll be the first to die. He will be gone as soon as the games begin. His hand is clammy and he tries to take it back again, a little ashamed, but Johnny doesn’t let go. If possible, his hold tightens.

“It’s a pity, because you really look like you could use a friend,” he says, shaking his head, and there’s something in his eyes - Ten really hopes it’s not pity - that keeps him glued to the spot.

Johnny sighs.

“You don’t know what you’re doing, do you?”

It’s obvious he doesn’t. His mentor has already given up on him and no one in their right state of mind would ever want him as ally. He’s not a killer. He’s a boy who works in a paper mill and spends a lot of time listening to the crackling of the wind against the tallest branches of the pines. He’s the least suited person to be here and it’s unfair, completely unfair, that someone like him was chosen. It’s the kind of feeling Johnny Seo – with his strong arms and big hands made to hold a net and a trident, with his large shoulders, long legs and innate, overflowing charisma, Johnny Seo who won the Hunger Games in less than three days – would never understand.

Ten is almost overcome with the urge of shouting against him, this silly privileged kid who fucking volunteered and won, because this is how it works in the rich districts.

Instead, he just says, “I’m Ten.” Now he would really like to take his hand back, but Johnny is still holding it like it’s his own. Since he can’t, he simply hovers there awkwardly, waiting to see where this is going.

Johnny smiles, the same dashing, powerful smile he reserve for his allies in the arena.

“I know,” he says. “You’re cute. It’s a pity you’re here.”

“You tell me,” replies Ten, and that makes Johnny’s smile crack wider, sadness seeping through the fissures, and Ten finds himself smiling too, because that’s what he does. When things are difficult or awkward, he smiles.

A door slams at the end of the corridor and Johnny’s face darkens. He quickly lets go of Ten’s hand and Ten stumbles a little, missing his warmth. He wants to say something, like a goodbye, because this is probably the first and also the last time he and Johnny Seo meet, and there’s a tiny part of him that wants to leave a big impression and a big part of him that simply wants to run away and hide forever, but against all the odds the first part is winning.

“Ten, are you there?”

It’s Taeyeon’s voice. He grimaces, and it’s with a certain surprise that he finds Johnny doing the same. It disappears quickly. When she appears, he’s smiling again, perfectly at ease and polite.  
“Where have you- Oh, Johnny, what a surprise! Did you find our lost child?”

It’s subtle, oh so subtle, the way he she walks between them, forcing Johnny to take a few steps away from Ten.

“Yes, I think he was lost. You should watch him better. Dangerous waters here, there’s a storm coming, or something like that.”

She frowns, clearly disapproving of his words, but she recovers quickly and they exchange perfectly polite smiles.

“It was kind of you to help him. We’ll be heading back, then.”

Johnny nods to Ten and Ten nods back, even if he feels Taeyeon glaring as he does. He doesn’t really understand what is going on and he doesn’t dare to ask, so he follows his mentor back to his and Yerim’s room in silence.

“What did you talk about with Seo?” she asks, after she’s slowly closed the door at their back. Yerim peeks up, curious, when Johnny’s name is made.

“Nothing, really. I just bumped into him and I fell and he helped me up when you arrived.”

Taeyeon doesn’t look entirely convinced, but it’s not like Ten is lying. That’s exactly what happened.

“Be careful with Seo. Don’t trust him. He betrayed all his allies last year. He’s a snake.”

It’s rich, coming from her, but Ten doesn’t comment.

It’s not like he needs her to know he cannot to trust Johnny Seo. And yet, Ten probably has less than six days to live. Who cares if he’s befriending the wrong person? Johnny Seo can’t fuck him up more than his own destiny has already done. And he was right, Ten can really, _really_ use a friend right now. Or something else.

~

There’s an entire world in the something else Johnny Seo can offer Ten.

Training is over and Ten has been able to show nothing to the Gamemakers, when Johnny comes looking for him in the showers. Ten is the last one in there. The boy from the Second, who’s three years younger and two times larger than him, and has left with a sneer, not before pushing Ten against the cold locker so hard his head is still ringing from it.

Ten waits until his footsteps have faded away, eyes prickling with tears, and locks himself in the bathroom before they start falling. He’s not a messy crier. He’s silent and methodic and he wipes his eyes with the sleeve of the training uniform when he’s done. Johnny is waiting for him when he comes out of the stall, leaning against the sink and looking every bit like he belongs there or in any other place where he wants to be.

He takes a long look at Ten’s red stricken eyes and Ten is so full, so empty, so done with everything that he can’t find the strength to feel ashamed. He can only look back, open and angry. Let Johnny make anything he wants of his tears.

“You look like shit,” he says, and Ten smiles. “I know. Not good enough for the cameras.” There’s a long pause. “I think I’ll look even worse after the games.”

It’s not a funny joke and Johnny doesn’t laugh. He looks… conflicted – if that is even an emotion that can grace Johnny’s face. He usually oozes confidence and authority when he appears on television, but there’s something now, something Ten has never been able to see in him. Something that shimmers weakly as his eyes trail on Ten’s face and linger on the curve of his jaw, unsure and tentative. Ten didn’t know Johnny Seo could falter, or hesitate.

“Listen,” he says, and his voice breaks, so he says it again for good measure. “Listen. I am an asshole. But I can help you.”

“No, you can’t. No one can.”

“I could. If you let me.” He sucks a deep breath in, the air sharp against his teeth. “You’d be surprised at the things I can do when I want something.”

“You want… something?”

Johnny’s eyes are intense and the way he cocks his head and just _stares_ , eyes narrowed and so black, is enough to make a blush creep under Ten’s skin.

“Don’t we all want something? I am an asshole and most the things I do are terrible. Even when I do nice things, I usually do them for the wrong reasons.” He takes a step closers. “But you can get something out of it, so we both get what we want.”

He waits for Ten’s answer but Ten isn’t sure he caught the question.

“What do you want?” he asks, confused, eyes wide, and he licks his lips, like he always does when he’s nervous, and Johnny makes a frustrated noise and walks towards him.

“This,” he says, splaying a hand on Ten’s collarbone and the other on his jaw, spread on his breath pipe. He tilts Ten’s head upwards to get a better look at him. “This is a waste,” he says again, under his breath, and Ten’s own breath hitches and he can only stare, dumbfounded and lost, his entire world reduced to the rough, warm pressure of Johnny Seo’s hand on his skin.

“Kim Taeyeon is a stupid, stupid mentor,” he says, and his thumb parts Ten’s lips slowly, carefully, but his eyes are still focused on Ten’s face, and he’s so close Ten can see himself on his eyes. He looks dazed, mesmerized. “She’s focusing on the little kid, when she has you. If you had been mine I would’ve made the whole Panem fall in love with you.”

Ten’s breath hitches and Johnny’s eyes drop to his throat. “You’re pretty, you know? You could’ve had so many sponsors. Most people who come here are good at lying, but everyone knows they’re lying. They still like them, but they know it’s fake, they know there’s a limit. But you, you weren’t lying, when you said you didn’t want anyone to die for you. That you wouldn’t be able to live with that burden.”

It’s not a question but Ten nods anyway, and Johnny laughs, sour and incredulous and low in his throat, almost like a purr.

“You are so clueless… This city would eat you alive. They would pay to see someone like you on his knees, you know? They’d take you apart piece after piece and leave only the bones.”

“What do you want?” asks Ten, so low it’s almost only a thought.

“You come to my room with me and I will tell you everything I know about the other tributes and the games and how to beat them. I won’t talk about my tributes, but I will tell you everything else.”

“And what will we do in your room?”

It’s a stupid question and Johnny only stares at him. “Nothing you don’t want. You’ll be able to leave if it becomes too much. I will not force you to do anything.”

He tries to act nonchalant but he stiffens when he says it, almost as if he expects Ten to walk away. Almost as if Ten would be able to refuse. 

“I know your mentor is not helping you,” he adds. “I can do it. I can give you a chance.”

“I’m still not going to make it, you know? Even if you help me.”

Johnny frowns and closes his eyes, chasing that thought away.

“Everyone has a chance. Even you.”

Ten swallows. It’s not true, people like him don’t have chances at good things.

“Why me?”

“Because you’re beautiful and I want you. And because you’ll probably die,” oh, it’s true, but it hurts more when someone else is saying it, “and I think it’s a fucking waste and there’s nothing I can do about it. So I’ll take what I can before Capitol takes you away.”

 

Johnny takes another step closer and there’s nowhere to run now. Ten’s back hits the door of the stall and Johnny is between his legs, big and tall and fucking solid, keeping him grounded with nothing more than his smoldering eyes and a hand on his jaw.

And he’s an asshole, of course, because Ten wants to survive, so he will say yes, of course. But deep inside he knows that even if he can’t make it, even if he is bound to die in five days in the Hunger Games, he wants this. Hell, Johnny could have offered him nothing in exchange and Ten would’ve still said yes. He wants to take as much as he can from Capitol City too, and he’ll take Johnny Seo if Johnny Seo wants to take him.

“Ok,” he says, softly, putting a hand on Johnny’s chest, there where he knows his heart is beating and watching something shift in Johnny’s eyes. He watches Johnny watch him, his eyes more focused, the same gaze he watched last year in television as an eighteen years old boy from the fourth district took the world by storm. Johnny is a fighter and Ten is a battlefield, and when he opens his lips to say it again, “Ok, ok, you can take this, you can take everything,” Johnny leans down and kisses him.

Johnny kisses well, with the kind of seasoned practice of someone who’s not used to a shortage of partners, but Ten is a natural, has always been a natural at this, and he’s had a lot or practice with Taeyong back in the Seventh. So he tilts his head, dropping it back against the door, forcing Johnny to chase him. He parts his lips and welcomes him in his mouth. He drags him in, arms around his neck, lacing his fingers at his nape, and bites down when Johnny grinds against him.

Johnny moans in his mouth, surprised and on the verge of coming undone, before he literally melts against Ten, blanketing him with his long, long limbs. Ten lets him go, pushing him away before things can get too dangerous. They’re still in the tiny bathroom, and their moans echo against the tiled walls.

Johnny chases his mouth one last time, licking against the upper lip and shuddering when Ten pushes him away. They stare at each other as they regain their breaths.

“It wasn’t the first time you kissed someone, wasn’t it?” He asks. He looks so... disheveled. Part blown out of his mind and part smug in an annoying I-knew-it kind of way.

Ten finds the courage to smile. “With a mouth like this? Dude, I had boys waiting in line for a chance to kiss me.”

Johnny laughs too, although a little breathless.

“I was right. Fucking wasted. Kim Taeyeon must be blind.”

He almost dives down again, but Ten stops him. 

“Not here. Not now. She will be looking for me and I can’t... I don’t want her to...” He shakes his head. “Listen, let’s not lie to ourselves. I don’t have much left to live and I want to do this. If it’s the last thing I get to do I want it to be amazing, so let me wash my face and let me go and make small talk with my mentor and then I’ll sneak out and you can take me to your room.”

Johnny nods, dazed.

“You’re different than what I expected,” he says, on a whim.

“Different good or different bad?” asks Ten, and Johnny shakes his head and doesn’t answer.

Ten leaves the bathroom feeling crazy, brave and weightless.

 

~

 

The memory of that kiss haunts the seam of Ten’s lips, where Johnny’s teeth have pulled softly and his eyes have lingered as they parted ways. He walks the distance between the training field and the corridors where all the tributes are sleeping as if he’s threading his way through a lucid dream.

He’s sure everyone can spot Johnny’s fingerprints all over his body with a single glance. They’re blatant and bold and his skin prickle, suddenly too small for his flesh and for his bones, unable to contain the dizziness and the arousal.

He walks inside the elevator, all hard lines, steel and glass, and he watches himself in the mirror. He’s the same person he’s always been, but at the same time he can barely recognize himself. Only a few weeks ago he was helping his sister’s husband in the woods, feeling the cold wind on his face laughing loudly at his nephew’s first attempts at walking. Only a few weeks ago he was playing cards with Taeyong and Lisa in the basement of Taeyong’s house, waiting for winter to finish so they could go out and play at the lake. Only a few weeks ago he wore a grey uniform and had a boy kiss him against the door of the toilet stall in the paper mill.

There’s no paper mill now, no woods, no basement under Taeyong’s house. There’s the Arena, waiting for its victims, and there’s the black uniform all the tributes must wear, and there’s a boy kissing him against the door of a toilet stall, a boy who’s willing to sell Ten a secret if Ten is willing to sleep with him.

Ten watches himself take that decision as if he’s another person, someone whose choices won’t really affect his life. (But this isn’t his life. His life was the other one, pine needles and brand new paper and his mama’s pies. Ten hasn’t chosen to have this new life and he hasn’t chosen to lose it in the games in a few days, but Johnny gave him a choice and Ten took it. That’s his choice. His own. Panem can’t take this away from him.)

Taeyeon is talking to Yerim when he comes back - debating the best possible allies since they have to choose someone before the games begin- and other than pausing for a moment at his arrival, they don’t seem to acknowledge his presence.

He tiptoes around them, hoping to sneak in his room without further questions, when Taeyeon stops him. “Where were you?”

“Oh, uhm, back at the training room.”

“Did you talk to someone?”

Well, he did, but... Not with a tribute, so he can’t really say it. He opts for a vague, non-committal, “Not really,” that has Taeyeon shoot him a dubious look.

Now Yerim is looking at him too and the chances of them forgetting about him so he can disappear and go to Johnny’s room become thinner and thinner every moment. He stands awkwardly at the door until Yerim clears her throat, demanding her attention back, and Taeyeon lets him out of the hook. Not really, though, because she comes looking for him after dinner.

“Johnny Seo is not a good person,” she says. “And he’s not taking care of you, no matter what he says. He has ulterior motives.”

“Everyone does. I have ulterior motives too.” She seems surprised, almost taken aback, by how calm he is about this. To be honest, Ten is too giddy for someone who’s riding a week long sugar high that will end with his departure from his world.

“What did he ask from you?”

“Nothing I couldn’t offer,” says Ten with a shrug.

“You know he sleeps with many people? You don’t know where he’s been, kid.”

“I don’t know where you’ve been either, and yet you’re the closest thing to an ally I have in this place and it’s not like you’ve been helping me a lot, right?”

This seems to hit her because she falters, for a moment. “Look, I...”

“There’s no need to say it. You think she has more chances to survive. But you know we will both die in the end. You’ve already used that trick once, no one will fall for it again.”

He’s been purposefully cruel now and he doesn’t like it. This is not the person he is. It doesn’t make him feel better but it takes the edge of the anger away.

“Believe me, I would like to give you all of myself kid, to believe in you and Yerim, really believe that you can do it. But the games took away most of me and my last ten years as a mentor did the rest. I have no comfort to offer you. I have none for me either.”

She’s so tiny, but her presence fills the entire room with emtpiness. 

“And even if I had some feelings to spare for you kids, I wouldn’t hope for your victory. I would hope for a clean, peaceful death. There’s no victory in these games. Even surviving is a defeat. So go, go to your boy. I don’t know who’s more fucked up, if it’s him for wanting to have you before you die or if it’s you for being desperate enough to let him. In the end you’ll both lose. We all lose. The odds are never in our favor.”

~

The door isn’t locked. Ten’s hand shakes on the doorknob and he forces it still. He lets himself in quietly. His entire body thrums with energy, but he doesn’t feel nervous. He just feels eager, and light enough he could almost fly.

From the balcony, the wind carries a gust of chilly air and Johnny’s voice, low and laced with nervousness. Ten almost chickens out, thinking the other boy has lied to him and that he’s not alone. He’s not ready to face the tributes of the Fourth, who look almost nice and could kill him in six different ways without getting their hands dirty. He takes a few tentative steps, diving deeper into the darkness of the house, and lets out a relieved sigh when he realizes that Johnny is simply on the phone.

The other boy looks up when he realizes he’s not alone, and Ten can’t miss the way his body goes tense and wired, ready to pounce at the sudden noise, only to relax when he recognizes the hesitant figure at the door. It’s the instinct of the fighter in him, the instinct of the games. Always hunting, always hunted. Almost one year has passed since the last Hunger Games, but Johnny is still on the edge. Ten wonders if he’ll ever be able to feel comfortable in his own body after that experience. 

Taeyeon said there aren’t winners in the games, that everyone loses. But Taeyeon survived and Johnny survived and Ten will not and it’s unfair. He only gets this night and he doesn’t want to waste it on needless fear, so he takes a step forward and falls into Johnny’s personal space, hands on his hips. It ignites a spark in the older boy’s eyes, something electric that travels back and forth between their eyes.

“I will call you back. Sure. Have a nice evening.”

Johnny hangs up and puts the phone down, staring at it for a moment too long, reluctant to look up and acknowledge Ten’s presence in the room. He looks almost... afraid. Which is ridiculous, considering he’s the one who’s invited Ten here.

It hits Ten, for a moment, how young this boy really is. How young they both are. They’re kids, the both of them, trying to play the grownup games and failing miserably. Utterly pathetic and weak, but not afraid, not tonight. There will be a time and place for that – the arena, in a few days, but it’s not here and now. Tonight, in Johnny Seo’s room, Ten can be fearless.

He takes another step forward, wedging himself between Johnny’s legs.

“Hey,” he says, and Johnny echoes him. “Hey.”

He licks his lips, not because he really needs to, but because he wants Johnny to follow his tongue, to wish he was the one licking his lips instead. It works. Johnny looks hungry.

“Who were you talking to? On the phone?”

Johnny’s eyes narrow. “A friend,” he says, and it’s a lie, but Ten doesn’t care. He’s so close he could splay himself on Johnny’s chest. Nothing keeps him from doing it, so he does. That’s what he came here for, right? A last wish, a last fuck, for him. A rich kid’s whim for Johnny Seo.

Johnny’s eyes widen when Ten all but drapes on him, they darken and his hand comes on the small of Ten’s back, to keep him from falling.

“Does Taeyeon know you’re here?” he asks, a breath away from Ten’s lips.

Ten simply nods and Johnny frowns. “What did she say?”

“That we’re both fools.”

They are, there’s nothing to be said about that. Johnny’s hand travels, from Ten’s back to his neck, to ruffle the short hair tickling his nape. His other hand settle down on Ten’s ass. They’re dragging the moment, stretching it thin. Bidding their time to build the momentum. They only have this night.

“Did she say anything else, about me?”

“That you’re not a good person. That you’re not taking care of me. That you have ulterior motives.” He hesitates. “That you sleep with many people.”

He wasn’t expecting Johnny’s hand to pull on his hair, forcing his head back. He lets out a choked moan, Johnny’s eyes are so so dark.

“It’s true, you know? I sleep with many people, and not always by my choice.” He pauses, staring at Ten’s mouth, groaning when Ten licks his lips again. “I want to sleep with you though, like a fool.”

Ten giggles and Johnny kisses him, slower than the first time, tender and delicate and almost shy. “This is the dumbest thing I’ve ever done,” he says, on his lips.

Ten wants to ask why – _It’s because I’m gonna die? Is it stupid to get involved with someone like me?_ – but Johnny doesn’t let him talk. He kisses him again, pulling him upwards, caging him with his arms, and Ten sighs against him, lax and soft and welcoming, he parts his lips and sucks on Johnny’s tongue, coaxes it inside.

They kiss for the longest time, until Ten’s head is spinning and his lungs are bursting, so caught in the sensation he forgets to do anything else, not even think, not even breathe.

Johnny’s fingers find his palm, the inside of his wrist, circling his forearm. The taller boy starts dragging him towards the bedroom and Ten lets himself be pulled, follows Johnny’s warmth like a moth chasing a flame. He’s never felt so fearless, so foolish, he never felt sure of something.

He’s not the boy who will die in the arena, he is the boy who pulls Johnny on the bed and climbs on him, hands on his chest, in his hair, on his lips, who opens his mouth to let Johnny kiss him deeper, thorough, wet and desperate and breathy. He grinds down, feeling Johnny’s dick against his thigh, smiles at the moan it elicits.

A disgrace, it’s a disgrace that he has to die, when this exist, the slide of his cock against Johnny’s, their underwear bundled at their ankles, kicked away impatiently to reveal more skin, endless plans of skins that only wait to be conquered. Ten could do this his whole life.

“This is not your first time, isn’t it?” asks Johnny, and he’s wrecked, completely wrecked, and Ten is wrecked too, because he did this. He reduced Johnny Seo to nothing but impatience, grabby hands, spit slick lips and eyes so black they’re bottomless. He simply laughs, triumphant and painfully aroused, from where he’s standing, spread on Johnny’s thighs, like a king on a throne.

He leans down to lick on Johnny’s collarbone, tasting the salt there - the sea, he thinks, this is what the sea must taste like - and smiles his most innocent smile. “What do you think? Does it feel like it’s my first time?”

Johnny exhales, all at once, when Ten’s hand closes on the top of his cock. Yes, this is what Ten knows, this is what he can do, what he chooses to do. Capitol can’t control him right now. _This is him._

He takes a hold of both their erections and slides them together, and it’s not wet enough, the friction hurts, but it’s a good kind of hurt, like a trainwreck, like playing in the woods and falling, scratching your palms and knees against the carpet of fallen needles on the ground.

“Does this live up to your expectations?” he whispers, blows really, into Johnny’s ear, leaning down. He misses the moment something shifts in Johnny’s eyes. He’s not ready when Johnny pulls himself up.

It’s so easy for him, so effortless. He dislodges Ten from his legs, flips him over on the bed, it lasts so little Ten barely understands what’s happening. The world spins and his back collides with the mattress and Johnny kneels between his legs, hovering over him, blocking the lights flooding inside from the open window with his chest. He kisses Ten again, fast and messy, like a challenge.

They rut like teenagers - they are teenagers, nothing more, nothing less, and Ten cants his hips up, up, up, keens at the wet slide of his cock against Johnny’s. He takes them both in his hand again, and a moment later Johnny’s hand, so bigger than his own, joins his own, and squeezes, and it’s suddenly too much. They come like that, like a mess of limbs, of tongues, of fingers, thunders in their ears and lightning in their eyes.

~

“Why me?” he asks softly in the silence of the night, Johnny’s hands splayed on his chest, lazy, light touches tracing his spleen, his collarbones, and then down, shy of his nipples. “You could have anyone you want.”

“More like anyone who wants could have me,” says Johnny, with a grimace.

“What do you mean?”

“What do you think it means?” Johnny sounds angry, something Ten doesn’t really understand. “What are we doing?”

Ten blinks. “Us? Now? I thought it’s crystal clear what we’re doing,” he says, defensive. He suddenly feels too naked, and he turns around to look for his clothes, a sheet, an escape, anything, but Johnny’s hand stops him.

“No, I mean. Not us _us_. I mean the Hunger Games. What do you think the Hunger Games are?”

The silence stretches. There are many things Ten could say. A trap. A game. A fucking mess. A clean way to kill people.

“Entertainment,” says Johnny, voice tight with barely controlled rage. “Panem’s entertainment. That’s what we are. Me, you, everyone. Do you think it stops after you win? Do you think it stopped after I won? If someone is rich enough to buy me, how can I refuse?”

Something clicks in Ten’s mind. Taeyeon’s sour face, the implications of her words. There’s no victory in these games. Even surviving is a defeat. _Odds are never in our favor._

Johnny, strong and clever and so handsome, who survived the Hunger Games only to find out that his victory was only the beginning of the real games. They’re pawns, all of them. All pawns in a bigger game.

“So what am I?” he asks. If I’m the whore of a whore, what does that make me? Where do I stand?

Johnny rolls towards him, and buries his face in Ten’s neck, breathing him in. His hands are big and warm on Ten’s wrists and his lips are insistent and stubborn on his mouth. Ten lets himself be pinned down by those hands. He lets himself be kissed by those lips. Johnny tastes like the sea.

“What am I for you?” asks Johnny, instead of replying, stubborn like a child.

There’s no point in lying and Ten is not even sure he would manage. Not with Johnny’s long fingers drawing arabesques and stars on the soft skin of his belly, scratching at the rapidly cooling mess of come. He moans and swap those obnoxious, distracting fingers away.

“You’re my last wish,” he says, with a sigh. “My biggest fuck you to the system. If I have to die, I want to have at least this.”

He doesn’t miss the surprised look on Johnny’s face.

“What?” he asks. “You thought I was doing this for your help? I’m more selfish than you think. I know I have no chances, with or without your advice. I’m here because I want this. I want you.”

He tucks a runaway strand of hair behind Johnny’s ear and smiles in the way that made all the boys in the Seventh feel weak and hot all over.

Johnny looks at him, and there’s the hint of a laugh washed away by sadness on his lips.  
“You’re a menace,” he says, wistful. “I saw you, during the interviews. You were so pretty, and it was clear that you had no chance. Everyone knew. And it was a pity, I thought, that a pretty boy like you had to die. And then you said that thing, about not wanting anyone to die for you, and you were so honest, so open, like you were glowing. You’re better than all of us. Me, the other tributes, all those rich fuckers from Panem. I just wanted a little of your grace. I have none for me.”

How can he talk about grace, Ten doesn’t know. The room is cold and they find each other, again. They chase each other’s warmth, skin on skin.

“You’re so silly,” murmurs Ten, voice shaking with fondness. “What grace? I’m just a selfish kid from District Seven.”

“I am selfish too,” says Johnny, his lips warm on Ten’s neck. He holds him close, like he’s drowning and Ten is the only thing that can keep him afloat.

“We both are. Selfish. Fools. It doesn’t matter, come here.”

~

Johnny takes him with the desperation of a first and last time. Every time. At dawn, before training and after, hungry lips and bites behind closed doors. Ten asks Johnny how come no one knows. They’ve been careful, of course, but it’s impossible to miss the bruised lips, all the times Ten came out of Johnny’s room with unruly hair and the faintest limp, feeling tender and raw and bruised all over. There are cameras everywhere, because it’s a game, a television program, they’re here for public consumption.

Johnny shakes his head, says, “You don’t have to worry, I took care of it.” Which, in Johnny’s cryptic language that Ten is barely beginning to understand, means that he probably slept with someone in the filming crew to keep things secret. Or with one of the Gamemakers. Ten can never know, with Johnny.

“They can see us in our rooms too?” he asks, in a tiny voice.

“No, that’s only us, only you and me, I promise.”

And Ten doesn’t know how he can trust someone like Johnny, who lies with his every breath, who killed people to survive, who knows Ten is going to die and just wants to take everything he can from him before it happens.

He takes and takes, like the sea from the shore, and what he gives back is broken and splintered, fragments of seashells, golden sand, relics of a shipwreck. He leaves bruises on Ten’s throat, like pale, falling petals.

He talked about grace and maybe that’s what he’s looking for, in the tender meat of Ten’s thighs, the crook of his neck, the ticklish, sensitive patch of skin behind his ears. Ten moans, high and breathy, and pulls on his hair, pulls him down, down, towards his crotch, until Johnny takes his cock in his mouth and twists his finger in Ten’s ass and everything almost comes apart.

Johnny fucks him on his knees and on his back, his cock a searing pressure against Ten’s insides. Against the window, Ten shivering because the glass is cold but Johnny is so warm. He draws him impossibly closer when one of the mute helpers knocks against the locked door and Johnny has to stop and send him away. That time, all it takes is Johnny’s hot breath on Ten’s neck and the faintest pressure of Johnny’s hands on his cock to make him come, clamping down on Johnny with a long body shudder. 

They lose count of how many times they’ve had sex, lost in the haze, frantic and desperate or long and lazy, like time doesn’t matter – but it does, it matters.

When their last night comes, Johnny sits on the edge of the bed and lights himself a cigarette. Ten quietly refuses. His chest is already heavy.

Johnny tells him about the other tributes, their mentors, their strategies, everything he knows. Everything he can tell. He doesn’t look at Ten’s face, his lips, his big eyes. His fingers shake around the cigarette.

Ten gets up and dresses himself slowly, following his actions on the mirror. His gaze lingers on the purple marks on his chest and he allows himself a half-smile and the courage to break the oppressing silence.

“It’s a pity I have to die,” he says, lightly, meeting Johnny’s incredulous eyes. “I would’ve liked to keep you.”

“Oh, really? You, keeping me?” What Johnny gives him is not a real smile, merely the ghost of it, but it’s _something_. They’re kids playing pretending maybe, but they’ll pretend until the end. “You mean the opposite, maybe.”

“I mean what I said.”

“I would’ve liked to see you try.”

Ten shifts closer, asking for a last kiss. Johnny obliges him.

“It would’ve been easy,” he says. “You’re in love with me, like a fool.”

Johnny’s lips brushes against his forehead as he takes him to the door in the washed-out light of a grey, foggy morning.

“We both are. Selfish and fools. May the odds be ever in your favor, Ten.”

“Goodbye, Johnny.”

~

epilogue: two days later

_Sixty seconds._

The vault opens slowly. Ten doesn’t know what he’s expecting, but it’s not darkness engulfing him completely, thick and deep and wet. The arena is completely black, like a starless night.

_Forty-seven, forty six._

Ten can’t see the other tributes. He can’t really see anything. He doesn’t need to.

_Thirty-two, thirty-one._

Ten has never been good with images, not since he almost lost his eyesight in an incident at the paper mill when he was only six years old, fearless and barefoot and running around where he shouldn’t have. It wasn’t the end of the world. He healed. Slowly. He learned how to walk in the darkness, how to find the right direction without seeing it. He learned how to survive on his own. He learned how to move in the darkness.

_Twenty._

Johnny’s words echo in his head.

_Fifteen, fourteen._

“Everyone has a chance. Even you.”

_Eight, seven, six, five, four._

It’s not true, people like him don’t have chances at good things, but maybe this time… This time…  
Maybe this time the odds will be in his favor.

_Three, two, one._

Let the Hunger Games begin.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Leave a kudos if you like it and come to find me on twitter @/aprilclaws if you want to rant about JohnTen ruining your life~
> 
> ♥


End file.
